A charity couldn't care less about some idiot pouring water on himself. All they want is the cash. Oh brother...

How would that encourage other people to join in and give more cash? Some millionaires giving a donation. People are inherently selfish so you have to encourage them to get something out of giving and having some fun is one way to do that.

@TallestSkil, because of how deadly it is once contracted extra precautions are being taken but it's not classified as being airborne.

Quote:

We caught up with Steve Morse, an epidemiologist at Columbia University, to talk about the outbreak and where it might go from here. Below are four key things we learned. […] “Ebola is not airborne, and it’s extremely unlikely that it will mutate to be airborne,” Morse says. Although it’s theoretically possible, it’s incredibly rare for a pathogen to change its route of transmission.

“Unlike infections such as influenza or tuberculosis, Ebola is not airborne,” says Dr Isabelle Nuttall, Director of WHO Global Capacity Alert and Response. “It can only be transmitted by direct contact with the body fluids of a person who is sick with the disease.”

Just for clarity, if a person with ebola sneezes and their saliva flies onto someone else's person, they may get ebola, but the disease isn't "airborne" in the medical sense of the word? For it to be classed as airborne, presumably it needs to be able to survive in the air for a significant amount of time, or indefinitely?

Nice picture, but it's not a complete story. Can non-airborne diseases be transferred from respiratory droplets exposed from the mouth? Maybe they can if the transference is direct and quick, and therefore, maybe that's what ebola is?

The question is: what does it take for a disease to be classified as airborne? I'm sure there's going to be a precise medical definition, so does ebola fit that?

I don't know exactly what that definition is, but the consensus seems to be no. You're the only one arguing otherwise, and you're doing it with pictures and an absence of direct citations from medical sources.

That's not the same thing. It's like saying the people flown from Africa to the CDC in Atlanta made Ebola airborne simply because the disease was flying in a plane. The same goes for spitting a loogie into someone's mouth. That doesn't classify it as being airborne. But that's beside the point, if WHO and CDC say it's not classified as airborne then it's not classified as airborne. If you want to argue that we should change the definition then that's something entirely different.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

A charity couldn't care less about some idiot pouring water on himself. All they want is the cash. Oh brother...

How would that encourage other people to join in and give more cash? Some millionaires giving a donation. People are inherently selfish so you have to encourage them to get something out of giving and having some fun is one way to do that.

You may be inherently selfish, but to extrapolate that to the whole human race is incorrect. If you are a good person, there is no need to be encouraged to give; you will do it anyway.

"If the young are not initiated into the village, they will burn it down just to feel its warmth."- African proverb

You may be inherently selfish, but to extrapolate that to the whole human race is incorrect.

They entire human race is selfish. Every last one of us.

You might as well say that the entire human race is murderous. Just because from time to time you may think murderous thoughts doesn't make you murderous. Just because you may sometimes be selfish doesn't make you selfish.

To reduce the human race to one emotion is to reduce to absurdity, and therefore you are making an untruth.

It is as true to say that the entire human race is good as it is to say that the entire human race is selfish. Pointless and meaningless.

"If the young are not initiated into the village, they will burn it down just to feel its warmth."- African proverb

You might as well say that the entire human race is murderous. Just because from time to time you may think murderous thoughts doesn't make you murderous. Just because you may sometimes be selfish doesn't make you selfish.

To reduce the human race to one emotion is to reduce to absurdity, and therefore you are making an untruth.

It is as true to say that the entire human race is good as it is to say that the entire human race is selfish. Pointless and meaningless.

1) Not everyone has murdered.

2) Self interest isn't an emotion.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

You might as well say that the entire human race is murderous. Just because from time to time you may think murderous thoughts doesn't make you murderous. Just because you may sometimes be selfish doesn't make you selfish.

To reduce the human race to one emotion is to reduce to absurdity, and therefore you are making an untruth.

It is as true to say that the entire human race is good as it is to say that the entire human race is selfish. Pointless and meaningless.

1) Not everyone has murdered.

2) Self interest isn't an emotion.

1 I didn't refer to the act of murdering, which is an action, but murderous thoughts, which is an emotion.

2 I didn't refer to self interest, which is different to selfishness.

To jump out of the way of an oncoming bus is an act of self interest, not selfishness. To eat all the cake at tea time with your family is selfish, as is murdering a ninety year old woman in the street for the $5 in her handbag.

"If the young are not initiated into the village, they will burn it down just to feel its warmth."- African proverb

1 I didn't refer to the act of murdering, which is an action, but murderous thoughts, which is an emotion.

2 I didn't refer to self interest, which is different to selfishness.

To jump out of the way of an oncoming bus is an act of self interest, not selfishness. To eat all the cake at tea time with your family is selfish, as is murdering a ninety year old woman in the street for the $5 in her handbag.

1) The original comment was being selfish. That's an act.

2) Self interest is selfishness. Everyone's selfish.

3) You're choosing to use two similar terms to define positive and negative self interest/selfishness.

This bot has been removed from circulation due to a malfunctioning morality chip.

1 I didn't refer to the act of murdering, which is an action, but murderous thoughts, which is an emotion.

2 I didn't refer to self interest, which is different to selfishness.

To jump out of the way of an oncoming bus is an act of self interest, not selfishness. To eat all the cake at tea time with your family is selfish, as is murdering a ninety year old woman in the street for the $5 in her handbag.

1) The original comment was being selfish. That's an act.

2) Self interest is selfishness. Everyone's selfish.

3) You're choosing to use two similar terms to define positive and negative self interest/selfishness.

Selfishness is commonly used as a negative trait, so your petty argument is moot.

"If the young are not initiated into the village, they will burn it down just to feel its warmth."- African proverb

The majority of things that people do are for selfish motives. People are well aware that there are other people in their locality who haven't eaten for days but they make no effort to sacrifice their own meal for them. When people go to work, they do it in return for money and would rarely overwork for the benefit of the company or the people the company serves. When people give gifts it's almost always for an occasion like a birthday or anniversary, people hardly ever just randomly give someone a gift. They meet an expectation of them in order that by satisfying that expectation they get an emotional reward (sometimes physical if lucky). Defining people as selfish doesn't mean they act selfishly 100% of the time, just the majority of the time and it's the exception when they don't. That's why people need to be encouraged to donate money; if people get nothing out of it then a lot of people simply wouldn't bother. It's a sad fact and the danger is in turning that observation into a positive life philosophy i.e recognising that people primarily look out for themselves and therefore that should be promoted as a good thing. Selfishness needs to be fought against or at least controlled to benefit the majority and that takes effort.

The majority of things that people do are for selfish motives. People are well aware that there are other people in their locality who haven't eaten for days but they make no effort to sacrifice their own meal for them. When people go to work, they do it in return for money and would rarely overwork for the benefit of the company or the people the company serves. When people give gifts it's almost always for an occasion like a birthday or anniversary, people hardly ever just randomly give someone a gift. They meet an expectation of them in order that by satisfying that expectation they get an emotional reward (sometimes physical if lucky). Defining people as selfish doesn't mean they act selfishly 100% of the time, just the majority of the time and it's the exception when they don't. That's why people need to be encouraged to donate money; if people get nothing out of it then a lot of people simply wouldn't bother. It's a sad fact and the danger is in turning that observation into a positive life philosophy i.e recognising that people primarily look out for themselves and therefore that should be promoted as a good thing. Selfishness needs to be fought against or at least controlled to benefit the majority and that takes effort.

I would say that you have a deeply cynical view of life that isn't true to the reality of it.

Here in England, there is no need to go hungry, as we cater for the homeless.

For you to say anecdotally that people hardly ever give a gift randomly is incredibly stupid. I can only presume that you speak for yourself, which would be sad. In my experience, people can be amazingly selfless and helpful. Yes, we can all be bad, we all are bad some of the time, but I don't recognise your vision of humanity.

"If the young are not initiated into the village, they will burn it down just to feel its warmth."- African proverb

Any woman who has ever allowed their partner to stick it in the bummy, trust me, I know, that's one of the most selfish acts a human being could ever do. Sorry, couldn't help my self please continue.Edited by Relic - 8/16/14 at 2:34pm

When I looked up "Ninjas" in Thesaurus.com, it said "Ninja's can't be found" Well played Ninjas, well played.

Oooh, how about that dude from the Koran, Muhammad or something, you know, the prophet guy with all of those virgin's. Which frankly I never understood the appeal, wouldn't a guy rather have 70 professionals, you know, the kind of girls you have to use a safe word with to make her stop dripping wax on your balls. 75 virgin's just sounds like, hmmmm, oh, a big ol'e sticky mess, the dry cleaning bill alone after the first nights orgy is going to be massive.Edited by Relic - 8/16/14 at 7:15pm

When I looked up "Ninjas" in Thesaurus.com, it said "Ninja's can't be found" Well played Ninjas, well played.

Again, I didn't say people are never selfless, it is just the exception. If it was commonplace, they would run out of awards for selfless services or not bother handing them out as they do now. There's a video here that shows how cruel humans can be. It's a disturbing video as it shows a 2 year old child left to die on a road in China after being run over:

That sort of thing wouldn't happen everywhere but the motivation in events like that wouldn't always be to help out and would rather be to avoid being seen as a complete degenerate by not helping out. In extreme cases like that, I would hope that most civilized people would help out but it's easy to see how people can be selfish in trivial scenarios when they can be in extreme cases like that.

If you want to believe that everyone is volunteering their work, giving gifts away at random and helping to end poverty and disease, so be it. It's not a world that I recognize.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Relic
frankly I never understood the appeal, wouldn't a guy rather have 70 professionals

Both are appealing I'd say for different reasons - being first has some merit. In some cultures, it is very highly regarded. That was evident with what Uday Hussein was doing:

"A chef at Baghdad's exclusive Hunting Club recalls a wedding party that Uday crashed in the late 1990s. After Uday left the hall, the bride, a beautiful woman from a prominent family, went missing. "The bodyguards closed all the doors, didn't let anybody out," the chef remembers. "Women were yelling and crying, 'What happened to her?'" The groom knew. "He took a pistol and shot himself," says the chef, placing his forefinger under his chin."

Uday kidnapped virgins specifically and quite a few killed themselves out of shame, sometimes they'd be burned with acid directly after so that no one else would have the same experience. It's the idea of exclusivity I suppose, pure selfishness.

Again, I didn't say people are never selfless, it is just the exception. If it was commonplace, they would run out of awards for selfless services or not bother handing them out as they do now.
If you want to believe that everyone is volunteering their work, giving gifts away at random and helping to end poverty and disease, so be it. It's not a world that I recognize.

Problem is, Marvin, you see things in black and white; the world isn't like that.

The great marvel of the world is that it is full of countless people doing countless selfless acts of love that are never formally recognised. That doesn't mean, however, that they don't happen. I don't need to believe that everyone does volunteering; I know that many do.

Trying to tally the number of awards for good service isn't a good way of trying to measure humanity's selflessness. Whilst getting an award is nice, it's not really a necessary thing. Volunteering services or giving as an act of charity is its own reward. For some lucky people, even their regular work is done as an act of love or vocation. They may get paid for it, but it isn't what drives them. I think Sir Jonathan Ive made some statement to this effect quite recently.

When you see the news, it is easy to form the impression that humanity is very black, as most news is bad news. Good news doesn't sell.

Edited by Benjamin Frost - 8/16/14 at 4:24pm

"If the young are not initiated into the village, they will burn it down just to feel its warmth."- African proverb